Day Trader’s Aftermarket Lounge 11 Mar 2019, page-100

@kenjikool : What your saying is correct and it's quite commonplace. Good Prop traders will operate with such trailing stops because they're working for someone else who rides them to maximise profits.

It's a little different being a sole trader because I answer only to myself. My average hold is around half an hour. On winning trades, about 50 percent of the time, the price falls shortly after I exit because I'm selling at a point when the chart/ticker is indicating the price is coming under pressure. The other 50 percent of the time the price will rise to varying degrees. Sometimes the continuing spike is significant but short lived, sometimes it's minor and on the rarest of occasions we see an episode like SPT.

The reason I don't attempt to catch these extra rises is that it potentially compromises my discipline. I'm selling at a time when the price is still being pushed higher thus allowing for a cleaner exit. If I were to make adjustments on the run with a trailing stop, I would run the risk of second guessing myself if the price reversed - 'I'm still in profit, I'll let it keep going through the new stop I've set and see what happens'. Many traders are disciplined enough not to allow this to happen. I would find this difficult as it would tend to alter my mind-set. This is a long winded way of saying, there are many ways to trade. It's about finding a style that works for you.